Ex has withdrawn permission for holidays abroad

[YorkshirePuddingsGreatestFan]

I split up with my ex-husband due to domestic violence. He is still abusive towards me and he refuses to have a civil conversation with me.

I have the divorce paperwork but there was never a court order or residence order or anything official drawn up for our child. I am the resident parent.

I have already booked a holiday and sent a polite courtesy email with the dates, flights and destination on as I usually do. I've had an email informing me that he has withdrawn his consent for her to travel abroad and will be informing the border agencies to prevent me leaving the country with her. There is no valid reason for him to do this, it's just sheer spite.

What steps do I need to take to get permission from court to go on holiday?

I have travelled abroad for holidays several times in the past with her. We visit museums, Churches, natural history sites and so on, so she gets a lot of learning from holidays. All my family is here, my dogs are here, my job is here and I'm a homeowner here. It's clear I'm going for a holiday and not intending to stay abroad and the holidays are beneficial to our daughter.

I thought you could go for 28 days without permission?

Do you have the same surname as your DD on your passport? If so I would just go.

I don’t think any border official would do anything on the say-so of an individual, I think your ex might be trying it on a bit there.

Just on a side note, there’s no point trying to be courteous to someone who “can’t have a civil conversation” with you.

That is very sad that he behaves like this, but contrary to the other posts in the absence of a child arrangements order I believe that the written consent of the other parent (who has parental responsibility) is required. If this isn't given I believe you should go to court under a "specific issue order".

Whether this is a technical requirement or will actually cause you problems in reality I'm not sure, but do bear in mind that he could use it against you in the future if you just go ahead against his wishes.

You need proper legal advice, this is abuse.

He is doing it to 'punish' you but he your DC will also miss out. He doesn't care about either of you.

Hope you can find a way round it

sorry I should say if he's going to be a nob for the entirety of her childhood years it's probably worth getting a defined child arrangements order stating your daughter lives with you along with formal contact times

Do border agents really check this as routine? How would, for example, a widow travel with their children? Would they have to carry their late husband’s death certificate whenever they travelled?

I thought you could go for 28 days without permission

Only if you have a child arrangement order:

www.gov.uk/permission-take-child-abroad

Sounds as if it will be worth getting a child arrangement order, as he will do this throughout her childhood. It could affect school trips, too.

And since it is the law, they could easily stop you at passport control.

You need legal advice.

I think (but am not certain) that you need to go to court as you have no current court order. If you take your child this may be classed as abduction.

What a spiteful awful man.

Speak to a family solicitor and get a child arrangement order in place.

No judge will refuse a child a holiday with their residential parent and will tell your ex he'd be wasting his money fighting it.

How old is the child? I remember that once 16 they don't need permission from parents?

I have same with my ex (wife). Happy for son to go on school trips out of the UK, but never allows son to visit me when I am working overseas.

Do border agents really check this as routine?

Yeah they do. I’ve never travelled without exH but when when we go abroad together with our children (we’re on good terms) they always check that we are their parents. Leaving the UK once they even said to DS, “Is this Dad?”. All really friendly but they did look.
In Germany really unfriendly and the woman said to me, “He [exH] could be your new boyfriend!” FFS

Oh should have mentioned that exH and I have different nationalities so probably come in for more scrutiny. Both white Westerners though [ie privileged]

Do border agents really check this as routine

I have taken Dc abroad on my own many times, as has DH.

They regularly ask the child “who is that?” Or “where is your Dad” (when with DH, answer “There!”, etc.

However neither of us has ever been asked for a letter of consent from other parent.

But then neither of us had ever alerted the border agencies to stop the travel.

That is the difference.

I (father) have been several times checked and stopped when travelling with a child, my wife never. Once the question of consent by wife was raised, but I simply asked them back if they would ask a woman the same and they backed down. which leads to the assumption that the answer would have been no. Later I learned that the same border post had been involved in some horrid scenes with an autistic boy who refused to speak to strangers and hence did not answer to questions 're who is mummy/daddy.

DD is 18 now but throughout her childhood I was never hindered from travelling by any border officials.

I do understand these things have been tightened up a lot in recent years so my experience is probably very out of date.

I hope you get to go on your holiday OP.

I got stopped and questioned by border control coming back in to the country (?!) because DS and I have different last names. It was fine because I have a court order but they do check.

He sounds a complete arse, I'd look at getting a child arrangements order.

DS and I travel together a lot and have different names - we've been verbally checked every single time. DS is also autistic so it's super-stressful because he might decide to be 'funny' and say something like 'nope, never seen her in my life before...'

That said, I don't know what level of credibility there needs to be before border control would put a flag on the system. Can you call them and check maybe?

That said, I don't know what level of credibility there needs to be before border control would put a flag on the system. Can you call them and check maybe

They will abide by the law, as explained in the link below. It is not their job to decide ‘credibility’, that is the job of the court granting the Child Arrangement Order.

Can you imagine if they said “yeah, the father asked us to put a stop on the child’s exit, but the Mum seemed credible....” and then there turned out to be a serious problem?

Put in for the Order. If he chooses to fight it it will cost him a packet.

And keep his threatening messages as evidence.

My friends ex did this. He couldn't bear the thought of her enjoying herself on holiday so was happy to put a stop to his children's enjoyment too. She took it to court and got a child arrangements order. She wanted a solicitor but couldn't afford it and managed fine without one.

if the holiday is weeks away you can just go to court and get permission he will need very good reasons to refuse permission
once you have done it once he is unlikely to pull the same stunt again
unless there is a very good reaosn no judge will refuse a 1-2 week holiday with mother during school holidays
if you are taking child out of school or taking them to a war zone he could argue that it is dangerous or technically not allowed and disadvantaging child's education but 10 days in France / Spain Florida at Easter or in the summer is not going to be turned down

Thanks all for the replies. I will look into going to court and getting an order so I can travel. I think the child arrangement one will be best in case he does this again. There are trips abroad from school once she gets to GSCE level and if she stays on for sixth form.

It's a short break to Iceland during the Easter holidays so a very very low risk country. It will not affect her schooling or have any impact on him.

My Dad died last year and left me a small sum of money. My daughter was very close to him too. I wanted to do something meaningful with it. He was very interested in astronomy and knew I was desperate to see the Northern Lights, so we're going Northern Lights hunting in his memory. That's why this hurts so much.

Do border agents really check this as routine

I've travelled to the UAE, SE Asia, Europe, US and Canada with my children as a single parent and never been asked once. We have the same name though, which probably helps.